Robert Conti

Robert
Conti was born in South Philadelphia, an area that has produced a
respectable number of great musicians including many legendary string
players. His interest in jazz guitar began in 1958 at the age of twelve.
With the exception of a brief period of lessons from Philly guitar
virtuoso, Joe Sgro, Conti is a self taught musician. However, he is quick
to credit Sgro as pointing him in the right direction. In his early teen
years, he began playing six-night engagements in a variety of show groups
in the Philadelphia/New Jersey area, and spending his summers on the road.
After graduating high school, Conti spent the next three years performing
throughout the United States and Canada with a variety of show groups out
of the Philly area.

While
traveling to Philly after a Miami Beach engagement in 1965, Conti made an
impromptu visit to a relative in Jacksonville, Florida. After three years
of constant traveling, he was enticed by the beaches and Florida's relaxed
lifestyle. That intended brief visit was the beginning of Conti's
twenty-two-year residency in North Florida. During the next four years, he
maintained a full teaching schedule and seized every opportunity to play
jazz in North Florida.

In 1970, a series of extremely unusual circumstances thrust Conti into
the securities business. During the following six years, Conti's talents
as an account executive flourished, as he amassed a host of coveted
financial industry awards for unparalleled business achievements. In fact,
Conti is credited as the mastermind of a highly sophisticated business
strategy that produced over five hundred million dollars of windfall
profits to a publicly held Florida company. Additionally, he advanced the
concept of the financial supermarket as early as 1974. Needless to say,
lofty achievements that are inconsistent with the typical personality
profile of an artist/jazz musician.

By late 1975,
the time demands of the high tension business of stock trading had created
a major void in his life. That void was the absence of his music. Having
attained all of his personal goals in the corporate arena, and no longer
enamored by corporate financial trappings, he decided to trade his three
piece suits and return to music. In early 1976, he resumed teaching
students, and focused his effort on regaining his previous technical
facility. In May of 1979, he recorded two albums for the L.A. based
Discovery record label. The results of those first recordings were a clear
indication that Conti had indeed regained his technical facility.Several
albums followed on the Discovery/Trend labels through the 1980s, including
a 1981 guest appearance as a featured artist on the extraordinary
arranger/conductor Gerald Wilson's "Orchestra Of The Eighties" - an album
that featured an all-star roster of L.A.'s finest jazz musicians. He was
also featured on one side of "The Living Legends" - an album with the late
Joe Pass.

In the early part of 1982, a business associate persuaded Conti to
participate in a short-term business venture. However, being cautious not
to abandon music because of the extreme time demands of the business
world, he managed to maintain a minimal performing schedule. As 1985 drew
to a close, he chose to focus all of his time to performing and writing
music. In 1986, Conti began performing in the Southeast, including a
performance as a headliner at the prestigious Florida National Jazz
Festival, where his sidemen included jazz giants, Jimmy McGriff on organ,
and Nick Brignola on baritone sax.

In the latter part of that year, he was invited to perform at a jazz
festival in Southern California, where he made an acquaintance with a
music fan who was an executive with Beverly Hills film producer, Dino De
Laurentiis. Two years later, that casual acquaintance resulted in Conti
accepting a position with the De Laurentiis organization. In the summer of
1988, Conti relocated to Irvine, California, a pristine and affluent
community just south of Los Angeles. Shortly after his relocation, he had
the misfortune of a serious injury from an office accident that required
months of extensive medical treatment.

Upon partial recovery from the injury, Conti decided to resume his
musical activity instead of returning to the De Laurentiis organization.
In early 1989, Conti met Steve Glen, an extremely alert Marriott Hotel
executive who quickly recognized that Conti was a major league musician
far and above the typically boring hotel pianist. As a result of Steve
Glen's sharp business acumen, Conti accepted a position as a house
musician performing nightly in the lobby of an airport hotel. That
engagement continued for nearly ten years.

I first became aware of Robert Conti in early 1990, as the Southern
California grapevine was continuously buzzing about a "monstrous
guitarist" when Conti began that hotel gig. In fact, I heard so much talk
that I decided to drive up to Irvine from San Diego to hear and draw my
own conclusions. Upon entering the hotel, I immediately heard loud
applause from a lobby audience that included business executives and the
usual cadre of guitarists absorbing every note. Within the first five
minutes of my arrival, it was apparent that everything I had heard about
this musician was true. In the midst of this bustling business hotel, here
was a solo guitarist whose technical prowess had an audience spellbound!
When questioned later that evening, as to his early influences, he quickly
cited Johnny Smith, Wes Montgomery and Howard Roberts as his heroes. Those
influences were readily apparent, as his playing tastefully merges the
stylistic trademarks of those super players into another fresh voice.

At the end of his performance, I introduced myself and asked if would be
interested in doing an album for my newly formed Time Is record label.
Conti responded, "Yes, only if I don't have to travel. This gig is
tantamount to my being on the road continuously, as the hotel is host to
numerous guests from all over the world. In effect, they are on the road."

In the years that passed since my first meeting with Robert Conti in
1990, I learned much more about the man other than the musician. He
epitomizes a complete paradox of disciplines. Most musicians are generally
in a tense state of mind in the recording studio. However, I observed this
man nonchalantly walk into a Hollywood recording studio and front an
all-star rhythm section to the absolute height of cooking straight-ahead
jazz.

In bold contrast to Conti's musical proficiency, his business/legal
intellect grants him the ability to function with razor-sharp efficiency
in the corporate environment, as he is just as comfortable in the midst of
a dozen lawyers and accountants. In fact, on first meeting, his demeanor
would cause one to readily assume that he is a corporate executive or an
attorney, as he is a cordial gentleman most untypical of the usual
artistic temperament of a musician of this caliber.

During the planning stage of "Comin' On Strong!", I suggested a blend
of mainstream jazz standards and original compositions that would showcase
his playing and writing abilities. The album contains five Conti originals
and four standards as follows: "The Rookie Bookie", "Wave", "Westbound",
"I'll Remember April", "Two Shpeens", "Bluesette", "The Shylock",
"Carnival", "Death By Chops- Dis'll Do It".

As a point of interest, each selection was a first and only take, and
the album was completed in three hours, and as one might imagine from the
titles of the Conti originals, the man has a sense of humor. When the tape
stopped rolling after the last selection, there was an eerie silence in
the recording studio. All eyes were wide open and jaws were on the floor,
following Conti's unbelievable display of his musical polish combined with
an awesome technical command that will defy belief. The exciting musical
events that took place in Hollywood on the afternoon of June 20, 1990,
were permanently preserved for the jazz archives! As the executive
producer of "Comin' On Strong!", I was extremely proud to produce a CD
that bristles with the fire and authority that is singularly Robert Conti!

In addition to the ongoing praise by fans who have heard him in live
performance or recording, voluminous rave reviews and accolades of high
praise have been written by highly respected jazz critics about this super
musician's unbelievable musicality and technical facility. As evident in
the Reviews section of this website, Conti received sporadic national
attention through articles in media such as: Guitar World Magazine (See
Reprint In The Reviews Section); Regional Record Chart Activity; A
Billboard Magazine "Album Pick Of The Week"

In April 1992, after hearing "Comin' On Strong!", Duncan Blaine of MNH/CD
Review stated: "Conti could be the greatest guitarist alive!" In a
September 1992 rave review, L.A. Times music columnist Bill Kohlhaase,
described Conti as "A world-class musician." A Billboard Magazine "Album
Pick Of The Week" article in May 1980 stated, "Conti is a superior
guitarist... A refreshing musical purity." In 1986, Conti was featured as
a headliner artist in the internationally televised Florida National Jazz
Festival, along with Miles Davis, Branford Marsalis, and Gerry Mulligan,
Spyro Gyra and others. That event was filmed live before an audience of
over One Hundred Thousand people. Conti's sidemen on that date included
Jimmy McGriff and Nick Brignola.

Unfortunately, Conti's business ventures in the 70's and 80's, and that
ten year hotel engagement took a toll on his music career, as jazz guitar
aficionados outside of Southern California were deprived of hearing Conti
on any new recordings after the release of "Comin' On Strong!" in 1990.

Fortunately, as a result of this website and the internet, the world
will now be able to marvel at the prodigious talent of this phenomenal
musician. His recently published "Source Code" books have been anxiously
awaited by every guitarist who has heard his work. As indicated in the
Discography section of this website, Pinnacle Records has reissued two of
his prior recordings. In addition, four new albums have been recorded and
are tentatively scheduled for release in late 1999. All of these events
promise an exciting new chapter in the career of this jazz giant!